Dive Brief:
- The U.S. Department of Transportation has room for improvement when it comes to managing its equity-related performance goals, according to a U.S. Government Accountability Office report issued July 23.
- The report found that while DOT’s equity performance goals are largely consistent with three of six federal performance management practices, the agency is missing the mark on practices related to its verification and validation of data used to measure progress, ensuring that the performance measure is clearly worded and establishing near-term performance targets for each fiscal year.
- The DOT said in a letter upon reviewing the GAO report that it concurs with the independent agency’s recommendations and will respond in more detail within 180 days.
Dive Insight:
President Joe Biden signed an executive order on Jan. 20, 2021, directing the federal government to pursue actions to advance “equity, civil rights, racial justice, and equal opportunity.” The administration further established the Justice40 initiative, setting a goal for certain federal investments that 40% of the overall benefits go to disadvantaged communities.
In response to those equity goals, the DOT established 14 performance goals to monitor progress toward achieving these targets within its fiscal year 2022-2026 strategic plan. These include increasing transit grants to rural areas, getting more discretionary grant applicants from disadvantaged communities and reducing the cost burden of transportation on U.S. households.
While the DOT has made progress in the performance management of these goals, it still has work to do, the GAO concluded. For example, the DOT did not include the 40% equity investment target in its FY2025 performance plan, although its June 2024 evaluation found that it had exceeded the Justice 40 goal for fiscal years 2022 and 2023. The GAO also found that three of DOT’s equity measures were either inconsistent with the described methodology or did not include a clear description of its methodology to measure performance toward these goals in two different documents.
The GAO made three recommendations to the DOT:
- Ensure that each equity performance goal have a target or milestone for the current and subsequent year in its annual performance plan.
- Clarify the performance measures or methodology descriptions for the goals that GAO found to be unclear.
- Revise descriptions of how the DOT verifies and validates data in the agency’s annual performance report for the equity performance goals GAO found insufficiently described.
The report concluded that DOT would be better able to assess its progress on equity performance goals over time if it adheres to all six of GAO’s management practices.
